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Mean summation scores for the actual, ideal, and ought selves on the Big Five personality dimensions.
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The current paper describes a repertory grid approach for measuring trait-based self-discrepancies. This novel method is strictly empirical and more parsimonious than extant methods for assessing self-discrepancies on per- sonality dimensions. We demonstrated this approach by measuring discrepancies between the actual, ideal, and ought selves on th...
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Context 1
... sum scores, or trait scores, ranged in value from -12 to +12. Means and standard errors were then computed and plotted in Figure 1. As can be seen, the ideal self was rated most extreme on the Big Five dimensions, followed closely by the ought self. ...
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... results are typical for the college population that was sampled. Lastly, if the Neuroticism trait scores are reflected, it can be seen in Figure 1 that the ideal and ought selves showed less variation in their means across the Big Five dimensions compared to the actual self. ...
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... alpha for all ten items in the present study was .88. Brief Symptom Inventory . The Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI; Derogatis, 1975) is a self-report questionnaire that assesses nine primary symptom dimensions (somatization, obsessive-compulsive, in- terpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, hostility, phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation, and psychoti- cism) as well as global psychological distress. The BSI consists of 53-items which participants rate on 5-point scales (ranging from “not at all” to “ex- tremely”) indicating the number of times during the past week they were bothered by a particular symptom. Basic language, equivalent of an American sixth grade education, is used in the instructions and wording of the items. Administration normally takes no more than 10 minutes, and Derogatis and Melisaratos (1983) report strong evidence for con- vergent and construct validity. The BSI has also been shown to yield data with good test-retest and internal consistency reliabilities. Cronbach’s alpha for all 53 items was .97 for the current data, and alphas for the anxiety and depression scales were .86 and .87, respectively. These two primary scales were examined in the analyses below. Participants rated their actual, ideal, and ought selves, as well as twenty-two other individuals on computers using Idiogrid (Grice, 2002). After read- ing brief instructions on the computer monitor, participants entered twenty-two names (e.g., Megan, Allen) or titles (e.g., Mom, Uncle Patrick) for individuals who most closely fit provided roles. The roles, adapted from Kelly (1955, p. 221-222), are listed in the Appendix. Disregarding misspellings, the participants were not permitted to enter duplicate names or role titles. If the same name or title was entered, they were prompted to think of another person or clarify that the entered name or title was in fact a different person by using a last name initial or other identifying mark. The ideal self was defined as “yourself as you would truly like to be” and the ought self was defined as “yourself as others would expect or like you to be.” Participants then rated their three selves (“myself”, the ideal self, and the ought self) and the twenty-two entered people on thirty marker items for the Big Five. The marker items were randomly selected for each participant from the one-hundred items comprising the International Personality Item Pool (Goldberg, 1999). The Big Five traits were labeled as Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Intellect. Six items were selected for each of the Big Five scales (e.g., six from Extroversion, six from Agreeableness, etc.). A 5-point Likert-type scale (-2 = Very Inaccurate, -1 = Inaccurate, 0 = Neither Inaccurate nor Accurate, +1 = Accurate, +2 = Very Accurate) was used for the ratings, and a standard item stem, “______ is the type of person who _____”, was used. The first blank in the stem was replaced with the name or role title of the person being rated, and the second blank was replaced with the personality phrase. For example, “Megan is the type of person who is the life of the party”, or “Mom is the type of person who gets chores done right away.” The twenty-five elements (3 selves and 22 others) were presented in random order to each participant and, for each person, the thirty personality items were presented in random order. The seven-hundred and fifty ratings were recorded in a 25 (roles/elements) x 30 (Big Five markers/constructs) repertory grid. Following completion of the rating procedure, participants completed a demographics sheet, the Brief Symptom Inventory, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Inventory. Participants were debriefed and thanked for their participation. Participants completed all tasks in 30 minutes or less. For each participant’s grid, the Big Five marker items were keyed in the same direction such that Means and standard errors were then computed and plotted in Figure 1. As can be seen, the ideal self was rated most extreme on the Big Five dimensions, followed closely by the ought self. The actual self was not rated as extreme as the other two selves on the Big Five traits and was most similar to the ideal and ought selves on Agreeableness and least similar on Neuroticism. Overall the participants viewed themselves as slightly extraverted, agreeable, slightly conscientious, slightly emotionally stable, and relatively high in intellect. They wished or high scores indicated greater levels of Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Intellect. The six marker items for each trait were then summed separately for the actual, ideal, and ought selves. These sum scores, or trait scores , ranged in value from -12 to +12. thought they ought to be more extraverted, more agreeable, more conscientious, less neurotic, and higher in intellect. These results are typical for the college population that was sampled. Lastly, if the Neuroticism trait scores are reflected, it can be seen in Figure 1 that the ideal and ought selves showed less variation in their means across the Big Five dimensions compared to the actual self. An important premise of self-discrepancy research is that trait scores fail to convey an important aspect of self-concept; namely, the intra-psychic tension between the various selves. In order to capture this aspect of self-concept, discrepancy researchers often compute disparity scores in which large values indicate greater discrepancies between the different selves and small values indicate greater self- congruity. In the current study, Actual-Ideal (A-I) and Actual-Ought (A-O) discrepancy scores were computed for each of the Big Five traits by taking the absolute values of the differences between the respective trait scores. The A-I and A-O discrepancy scores consequently ranged in value from 0 to 24, with 0 representing no discrepancy and 24 representing the greatest discrepancy possible. As can be seen in Table 1, the average self- Table 2 displays the bivariate correlations between the Big Five A-I and A-O discrepancies and measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. Consis- discrepancies for the Big Five traits were small, ranging from 2.44 to 5.50. Examination of fre- quency histograms also revealed that all discrepancies were positively skewed. Thus, while a wide range of values in both A-I and A-O discrepancies were seen across the Big Five traits, the vast major- ity of discrepancies were small in magnitude. The largest average A-I and A-O discrepancies were noted for Neuroticism, whereas the smallest averages of the two discrepancies were noted for Agreeableness. The descriptive statistics for the measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem reported in Table 1 also reveal low variability in the participants’ responses. High scores for the depression, anxiety, and self-esteem measures indicated higher levels of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. On average the students reported low levels of depression and anxiety and high levels of self-esteem. tent with previous studies, the correlations between self-discrepancies were large (> .75) and highly significant within each trait. In other words, partici- pants reporting high A-I discrepancies for a given Big Five trait tended to report high A-O discrepancies as well. Even across traits the A-I and A-O discrepancies were moderately (> .30) and significantly correlated. Those participants reporting high A-I discrepancies on one trait therefore tended to report large A-O discrepancies on the other four traits as well. Lastly, participants reporting high A-I discrepancies for a given trait tended to report high A-I discrepancies on the other four traits, and participants reporting high A-O discrepancies for a given trait tended to report high A-O discrepancies on the other four traits as well. Prior research has shown that once variation in ratings of the actual self are controlled, ratings for the ideal self fail to predict measures of psychological well-being (Wylie, 1961). In other words, variation attributable to the actual self ratings alone may drive the relationships between the self-discrepancies and measures of psychological well-being. We therefore With regard to the measures of psychological well-being (see Table 2), high A-I discrepancies on Extraversion predicted greater levels of depression and anxiety. Greater A-I and A-O discrepancies on Conscientiousness also predicted higher levels of anxiety. High A-I and A-O discrepancies on Extraversion and Neuroticism predicted lower scores of self-esteem, and high A-I discrepancies on Conscientiousness predicted lower scores of self-esteem. While all of these correlations were statistically significant at the .05 level, the absolute magnitudes were low (< .30). computed semi-partial correlations between the A-I and A-O discrepancies and the measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem, controlling for the effects of the actual self in each measure of psychological well-being. These semi-partial correlations are reported in Table 3 and show the discrepancies’ unique contribution above and beyond the actual self ratings when predicting depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. Only two of the nine original self- discrepancy correlations remained significant when actual self ratings were controlled (cf., Table 2). Specifically, the two semi-partial correlations between anxiety and the A-I and A-O discrepancies on Conscientiousness (controlling for actual self Conscientiousness ratings) were statistically significant. Additionally, the semi-partial correlation between anxiety and the A-O Intellect discrepancy (controlling for actual self Intellect ratings) was significant. Participants with greater discrepancies tended to According to Higgins’ self-discrepancy theory, discrepancies between the actual and ideal selves should predict self-reported levels of depression when controlling for variability in the Actual-Ought (A-O) discrepancies. In other ...
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... and correlated with various measures of psychological well- being, similar to previous studies. These discrepancy scores can also be used to assess the specific predictions of Higgins’ self-discrepancy theory. One hundred twenty-five undergraduate students (69 women and 56 men), 18 to 29 years of age ( M = 19.6, Mdn = 19, SD = 1.76), participated in this study in exchange for course credit. The sample consisted of 81.6 percent Caucasians, 4.8 percent Native Americans, 4.0 percent African Americans, 3.2 percent Asian-Pacific Islanders, 1.6 percent Hispanics, and 4.8 percent of the participants reported their ethnicity as “other.” Rosenberg Self Esteem Inventory . The Rosenberg Self Esteem Inventory (RSEI; Rosenberg, 1965, p. 17-18) is a ten-item self-report instrument that measures global self-esteem. Participants rate each evaluative item on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from “disagree strongly” to “agree strongly.” Good reliability and construct validity for data generated from the RSEI have been reported (Goldsmith, 1986). Cronbach’s alpha for all ten items in the present study was .88. Brief Symptom Inventory . The Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI; Derogatis, 1975) is a self-report questionnaire that assesses nine primary symptom dimensions (somatization, obsessive-compulsive, in- terpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, hostility, phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation, and psychoti- cism) as well as global psychological distress. The BSI consists of 53-items which participants rate on 5-point scales (ranging from “not at all” to “ex- tremely”) indicating the number of times during the past week they were bothered by a particular symptom. Basic language, equivalent of an American sixth grade education, is used in the instructions and wording of the items. Administration normally takes no more than 10 minutes, and Derogatis and Melisaratos (1983) report strong evidence for con- vergent and construct validity. The BSI has also been shown to yield data with good test-retest and internal consistency reliabilities. Cronbach’s alpha for all 53 items was .97 for the current data, and alphas for the anxiety and depression scales were .86 and .87, respectively. These two primary scales were examined in the analyses below. Participants rated their actual, ideal, and ought selves, as well as twenty-two other individuals on computers using Idiogrid (Grice, 2002). After read- ing brief instructions on the computer monitor, participants entered twenty-two names (e.g., Megan, Allen) or titles (e.g., Mom, Uncle Patrick) for individuals who most closely fit provided roles. The roles, adapted from Kelly (1955, p. 221-222), are listed in the Appendix. Disregarding misspellings, the participants were not permitted to enter duplicate names or role titles. If the same name or title was entered, they were prompted to think of another person or clarify that the entered name or title was in fact a different person by using a last name initial or other identifying mark. The ideal self was defined as “yourself as you would truly like to be” and the ought self was defined as “yourself as others would expect or like you to be.” Participants then rated their three selves (“myself”, the ideal self, and the ought self) and the twenty-two entered people on thirty marker items for the Big Five. The marker items were randomly selected for each participant from the one-hundred items comprising the International Personality Item Pool (Goldberg, 1999). The Big Five traits were labeled as Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Intellect. Six items were selected for each of the Big Five scales (e.g., six from Extroversion, six from Agreeableness, etc.). A 5-point Likert-type scale (-2 = Very Inaccurate, -1 = Inaccurate, 0 = Neither Inaccurate nor Accurate, +1 = Accurate, +2 = Very Accurate) was used for the ratings, and a standard item stem, “______ is the type of person who _____”, was used. The first blank in the stem was replaced with the name or role title of the person being rated, and the second blank was replaced with the personality phrase. For example, “Megan is the type of person who is the life of the party”, or “Mom is the type of person who gets chores done right away.” The twenty-five elements (3 selves and 22 others) were presented in random order to each participant and, for each person, the thirty personality items were presented in random order. The seven-hundred and fifty ratings were recorded in a 25 (roles/elements) x 30 (Big Five markers/constructs) repertory grid. Following completion of the rating procedure, participants completed a demographics sheet, the Brief Symptom Inventory, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Inventory. Participants were debriefed and thanked for their participation. Participants completed all tasks in 30 minutes or less. For each participant’s grid, the Big Five marker items were keyed in the same direction such that Means and standard errors were then computed and plotted in Figure 1. As can be seen, the ideal self was rated most extreme on the Big Five dimensions, followed closely by the ought self. The actual self was not rated as extreme as the other two selves on the Big Five traits and was most similar to the ideal and ought selves on Agreeableness and least similar on Neuroticism. Overall the participants viewed themselves as slightly extraverted, agreeable, slightly conscientious, slightly emotionally stable, and relatively high in intellect. They wished or high scores indicated greater levels of Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, and Intellect. The six marker items for each trait were then summed separately for the actual, ideal, and ought selves. These sum scores, or trait scores , ranged in value from -12 to +12. thought they ought to be more extraverted, more agreeable, more conscientious, less neurotic, and higher in intellect. These results are typical for the college population that was sampled. Lastly, if the Neuroticism trait scores are reflected, it can be seen in Figure 1 that the ideal and ought selves showed less variation in their means across the Big Five dimensions compared to the actual self. An important premise of self-discrepancy research is that trait scores fail to convey an important aspect of self-concept; namely, the intra-psychic tension between the various selves. In order to capture this aspect of self-concept, discrepancy researchers often compute disparity scores in which large values indicate greater discrepancies between the different selves and small values indicate greater self- congruity. In the current study, Actual-Ideal (A-I) and Actual-Ought (A-O) discrepancy scores were computed for each of the Big Five traits by taking the absolute values of the differences between the respective trait scores. The A-I and A-O discrepancy scores consequently ranged in value from 0 to 24, with 0 representing no discrepancy and 24 representing the greatest discrepancy possible. As can be seen in Table 1, the average self- Table 2 displays the bivariate correlations between the Big Five A-I and A-O discrepancies and measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. Consis- discrepancies for the Big Five traits were small, ranging from 2.44 to 5.50. Examination of fre- quency histograms also revealed that all discrepancies were positively skewed. Thus, while a wide range of values in both A-I and A-O discrepancies were seen across the Big Five traits, the vast major- ity of discrepancies were small in magnitude. The largest average A-I and A-O discrepancies were noted for Neuroticism, whereas the smallest averages of the two discrepancies were noted for Agreeableness. The descriptive statistics for the measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem reported in Table 1 also reveal low variability in the participants’ responses. High scores for the depression, anxiety, and self-esteem measures indicated higher levels of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. On average the students reported low levels of depression and anxiety and high levels of self-esteem. tent with previous studies, the correlations between self-discrepancies were large (> .75) and highly significant within each trait. In other words, partici- pants reporting high A-I discrepancies for a given Big Five trait tended to report high A-O discrepancies as well. Even across traits the A-I and A-O discrepancies were moderately (> .30) and significantly correlated. Those participants reporting high A-I discrepancies on one trait therefore tended to report large A-O discrepancies on the other four traits as well. Lastly, participants reporting high A-I discrepancies for a given trait tended to report high A-I discrepancies on the other four traits, and participants reporting high A-O discrepancies for a given trait tended to report high A-O discrepancies on the other four traits as well. Prior research has shown that once variation in ratings of the actual self are controlled, ratings for the ideal self fail to predict measures of psychological well-being (Wylie, 1961). In other words, variation attributable to the actual self ratings alone may drive the relationships between the self-discrepancies and measures of psychological well-being. We therefore With regard to the measures of psychological well-being (see Table 2), high A-I discrepancies on Extraversion predicted greater levels of depression and anxiety. Greater A-I and A-O discrepancies on Conscientiousness also predicted higher levels of anxiety. High A-I and A-O discrepancies on Extraversion and Neuroticism predicted lower scores of self-esteem, and high A-I discrepancies on Conscientiousness predicted lower scores of self-esteem. While all of these correlations were statistically significant at the .05 level, the absolute magnitudes were low (< .30). computed semi-partial correlations between the A-I and A-O discrepancies and the measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem, controlling for the ...
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Citations
... Looking beyond the Big Five, research in the fields of social and personality psychology has produced a plethora of studies concerning self-discrepancies. The greatest share is focused on Higgins' Self-Discrepancy Theory (Higgins, 1987;Higgins, 1989;Mason et al., 2019;Mcdaniel & Grice, 2005;McDaniel & Grice, 2008). Self-Discrepancy Theory states that individuals have three different internalized selfstate representations, which are the Actual Self, how one really is, the Ideal Self, how one wishes to be, and the Ought Self, how one feels one should be. ...
... Specifically, according to Higgins' Theory, discrepancies between the Actual Self and the Ideal/Ought Self increase emotional vulnerability (Higgins, 1987;1989). Research has demonstrated that discrepancies are negatively related to SWB (Pavot et al., 1997) and predict an increase in factors related to psychological well-being such as anxiety, self-esteem, and depression (Kelly et al., 2015;McDaniel & Grice, 2005. In the Self-Discrepancy research, individuals are asked about their own understanding of their different self-states on a general level (Higgins, 1987). ...
... In the Self-Discrepancy research, individuals are asked about their own understanding of their different self-states on a general level (Higgins, 1987). Not much research has specified the self-states in the form of personality traits and created personality trait Self-Discrepancies (with a few exceptions, see McDaniel & Grice 2005). Nor has much research operationalized the self-representations of the Actual Self indirectly (i.e., not asking explicitly what a person's Actual/Ideal/Ought self is), which is how personality is generally assessed. ...
Discrepancies in views of the Self are suggested to be negatively related to well-being (Higgins, 1987). In the present study, we used a novel concept, Personality Estimation Discrepancy (PED), to test this classic idea. PED is defined as the computed difference between how one view oneself (Self-Perceived Personality) and a standard Big Five test (IPIP-NEO-30). In a pre-registered (osf.io) UK online study (N = 297; Mage = 37, SD = 14) we analyzed: (1) whether PED would predict Subjective Well-Being (SWB; Harmony in Life, Satisfaction with Life, Positive affect, Negative Affect) and Self-Insight, and (2) whether Self-Insight would mediate the relationship between PED and SWB. The results showed that underestimation of Extraversion, Conscientiousness, and Emotional Stability indeed is associated with both high SWB and high Self-Insight. However, these effects mostly disappeared when controlling for the Big Five test scores. Furthermore, Self-Insight largely (42.9%) mediated the relationship between the mis-estimation and SWB. We interpret these finding such that the relationship of mis-estimating one's personality with SWB and Self-Insight are mostly explained by the Big Five factors, yet the discrepancy is a dependent feature of scoring particularly high or low on certain personality traits.
Supplementary information:
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-022-03396-1.
... Scholars further argue that multiple dimensions collectively make up an individual's selfconcept, including the actual self, the ideal self, the social self, and the ideal social self (Govers & Schoormans, 2005;Rosenberg, 1979;Sirgy, 1982). These divisions find contestation in scholarly literature, as well as numerous expanded interpretations that include the ought self, basic self, extended self, undesired self, real self, future self, feared self, situational self, expected self, possible self and the other self (McDaniel & Grice, 2005;Schalk, 2011;Sirgy, 1982). The disagreement on how the self-concept is divided in the literature complicates how its meaning can be understood and, consequently, the approaches to its investigation (Baumeester, 1998;Govers, 2004). ...
Understanding product semantics and affective perceptions of product consumers undoubtedly offer significant value for industrial designers and their design practice. Deconstructing affective perceptions is a methodologically challenging task as it is implicit and subjective and is influenced by an individual’s aesthetic experience. Accordingly, how products are perceived differs among individuals or consumers, particularly in the distinct experiences that contribute to constructing an individual’s sense of perception of self or self-concept. Furthermore, research has shown that individuals are implicitly drawn to products that reaffirm and communicate their self-concept. If an individual’s preferences for products can reflect or enhance their self-concept, this suggests that understanding the underlying perceptual processes between the self-concept and product semantics can productively inform industrial design research.
The thesis research develops and adapts methods from the disciplines of psychology, marketing, and industrial design to investigate these underlying perceptual processes of the self-concept and its relationships to product semantics. The thesis research investigates the underlying processes through a study on kettles that discloses the variances in sensory and cognitive evaluation and judgements through the process of aesthetic experience. The thesis further investigates the cognitive influences of the self-concept to reveal the mental models associated with the visual aesthetics of product form and how this influences aesthetic responses through product personality congruence. The thesis argues that the self-concept is a multidimensional construct reflected, in particular, through an individual’s (1) gender identity, (2) personality, (3) aesthetic sensitivity, and (4) interest, taste, and goals, that plays a vital role in the aesthetic experience of products. The thesis’s findings indicate that these individual components of the self-concept are essential in that they interplay in how the symbolic meaning of product semantics is visually perceived. The outcome of this thesis assists in, primarily, revealing the underlying stages of visual aesthetic processing to understand how product semantics is perceived through an individual’s self-concept.
... The elements selected for the repertory grid interview were allied health professional work roles/titles, including Current work position, Ideal position, and a Successful Remote professional. The Ideal element acted as the standard against which the other elements (work roles) were compared in terms of the participants preferred work role characteristics [45]. Following standard repertory grid practice [44], constructs were elicited using triadic presentation. ...
Purpose
Allied health workforce recruitment and retention in remote areas is a global problem. Using case studies from the Australian allied health workforce, this paper adds new information by combining personality trait information with a detailed understanding of how the cases construe the demands of remote work, which may be useful in addressing this problem.
Methods
Four cases (two urban, two remote) are presented from a mixed methods study (n = 562), which used (1) the Temperament and Character Inventory to investigate personality traits of allied health professionals; and (2) repertory grid interviews to reveal quantitatively and qualitatively how the cases construed their Ideal work role compared with their Current and a Remote role. Cases also self-assessed their fit (‘suited’ or ‘not suited’) with remote.
Findings
Differences in the way cases construed their fit with remote work was related to prior experience. However all were satisfied with their work, perceiving their Current role as similar to their Ideal. All saw remote work as requiring generalist expertise and a reliance on relationships. Personality traits, especially Novelty Seeking and Harm Avoidance, fit with how allied health professionals perceived their role.
Conclusions
The combination of two distinct lines of investigation, illustrates what more can be revealed about allied health professional’s career choices by taking into account the fit or lack of fit between their personality tendencies, their construing of remote work and their life circumstances. Understanding the combined influence of perceptions and traits on an individual toward or away from remote work may enhance recruitment and retention internationally.
... This effect was only found, however, when an idiographic, rather than a nomothetic, self-discrepancy measure was used. Other researchers have also failed to support the efficacy of nomothetic measures of selfdiscrepancies for predicting depression, anxiety, and self-esteem (Key, Mannella, Thomas, & Gilroy, 2000;McDaniel & Grice, 2005). In a similar vein, Watson and Watts (2001) found idiographic self-discrepancies were stronger predictors of neuroticism than nomothetic self-discrepancies. ...
This study examined the associations between self-discrepancies, assessed both idiographically and nomothetically, and measures of depression, anxiety, and self-esteem. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that actual – ideal and actual – ought self-discrepancies were significant predictors of the three measures of psychological well-being, even while controlling for individual variability in ratings of the actual self. Further analysis indicated these effects were primarily attributable to the nomothetic, rather than the idiographic, measures of self-discrepancies. Lastly, the results failed to support the central predictions of Higgins' (198717.
Higgins , E. T. 1987. Self-discrepancy: A theory relating self and affect. Psychological Review, 94(3): 319–340. [CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]View all references) self-discrepancy theory. Specifically, for both the idiographic and nomothetic measures the actual – ideal discrepancies were not found to be uniquely predictive of depression and the actual – ought discrepancies were not found to be uniquely predictive of anxiety. The results were discussed with regard to the general self-discrepancy literature as well as self-discrepancy theory in particular.
Background
Cognitive models of post-traumatic psychological adjustment have implicated both self-concept and self-appraisals in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Two studies investigated the relationship between self-concept and trauma-related self-appraisals, and whether culture influenced this relationship.
Method
In Study 1, a student sample (Asian n = 41, British n = 34) who self-identified as having been through a trauma or extremely stressful event completed measures of self-concept, trauma-related self-appraisals and trauma-related distress. Study 2 extended this by asking Asian ( n = 47) and British ( n = 48) trauma survivors with and without PTSD to complete the same self measures as those administered in Study 1.
Results
Study 1 found that overall for the British group, disruptions in self-concept (i.e. self-discrepancies and trauma-themed self-concept) correlated significantly with negative self, world and self-blame appraisals and depression. However, the same was not found in the Asian group. Study 2 found that pan-culturally those with PTSD had greater self-discrepancies and trauma-defined self-concept than those without PTSD. Additionally, pan-culturally, trauma-defined self-concept correlated significantly with negative self appraisals and depression; ideal self-discrepancies correlated significantly with negative self-appraisals across cultures and depression for the British group; while ought self-discrepancies correlated significantly with negative world appraisals for the Asian group and negative self and self-blame appraisals for the British. Lastly, negative self, world and self-blame appraisals correlated with symptoms of depression.
Conclusions
Taken together, the findings relay the important associations between appraisals, self-concept and post-traumatic psychological adjustment.
Self-discrepancies influence psychological well-being and self-acceptance across several domains. Middle to late childhood is a critical age for the development of self-discrepancies (SD). The present study was aimed at investigating antecedents of actual/ideal self-discrepancies in 9-to 11-year-old children by adopting a repeated measure design, with two measurement occasions. At the baseline (T1), children (N=261) completed a self-esteem questionnaire, a measure of actual/ideal SDs we developed around the Five Factor Model domains, and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire; 4 months later (T2) a subsample (N=96) provided self-ratings again. Children's parents (N=195) referred on their own feelings towards their children along the Profile of Mood States as well as on their perceived locus of control of their children's undesirable behaviors; a subsample of parents (N=80) provided ratings again 4 months later. Principal component analyses from children's self-discrepancies at T1 yielded four domains: Intellect, Emotional Stability, Impulse Control, and Sociability. Self-rated discrepancies across time were moderately stable. Concurrently, higher SDs in Intellect were associated with lower children's self-esteem. Cross-lagged pattern analyses showed that lower self-esteem predicted increases in children's SDs, but not vice versa; in addition, change levels in SDs were correlated with change levels in self-esteem. Parents' perceived internal locus of causality of their children's undesirable behaviors also accounted for changes in children's SDs. Parents' feelings of depression accounted for increases in girls' SDs. The present findings further support the association between self-esteem and SDs, indicate the direction of association across time, and suggest possible mechanisms by which parents affect the development of the children's self-views.
In the publication My teacher self: Professional self-concept of a pre-service teacher, the results of the qualitative research into the professional self-concept of students at the Faculty of Education at the Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic are presented. The theoretical part of the publication studies the concepts of self-concept and professional self-concept, and explains the significance of positive self-concept for the work of the teacher. The research presented is a grounded theory research using a multimethod approach for collecting data. Thus, the free response was proven a valid tool for studying professional self-concept. The part of the publication in which the results are presented highlights the dominant aspects of professional self-concept of teacher students and their relationship to the concepts of the self-discrepancy theory – the ideal, ought and actual selves. Furthermore, it examines the possible selves, i.e. the wanted and unwanted expectations of students from their future development in the role of the teacher. Attention is paid to the process of development of the professional self concept – to its key factors and individual stages. The publication also suggests possible or desirable interventions that can help the faculty educating the future teachers support the process of development of professional self-concept of undergraduate student teachers.
Neben den hohen fachlichen Ansprüchen an die Expertise der Sportpsychologen stellt das Qualitätsmanagement in den letzten Jahren eine der wichtigsten Heraus-forderung der angewandten Sportpsychologie dar (Kleinert & Brand 2011).
Als Beitrag zu den Bestrebungen, dieses Qualitätsmanagement zu optimieren (vgl. z.B. Eberspächer, Immenroth & Mayer, 2002; Eberspächer, Mayer, Hermann & Kuhn, 2005; Kuhn, Hermann & Mayer, 2011), ist es das zentrale Anliegen dieser Arbeit, als Teil einer Tätigkeitsfeldanalyse die Sichtweise der Bundestrainer auf die sportpsychologische Betreuung in den deutschen Spitzenkadern zu erfassen. Ziel der primär explorativen Aufgabenstellung ist es, unter Berücksichtigung dienstleis-tungs- und leistungssportrelevanter Überlegungen Qualitätskriterien aufzudecken, die aus Sicht der Auftraggeber eine dafür wesentliche Rolle spielen.
Die Operationalisierung der Fragestellung erfolgt mit Hilfe der Repertory Grid
Technik. Die konstruktivistischen Grundlagen dieser Technik und die damit verbun-denen methodischen Besonderheiten werden vorgestellt und diskutiert.
Die vorgenommenen quantitativen Analysen ergeben eine insgesamt hohe Zufrie-denheit der deutschen Bundestrainer mit der Arbeit der Sportpsychologen. Weiterhin finden sich mit Hilfe von Clusteranalysen und qualitativen Analysen Verbesserungspotenziale auf Basis der Qualitätswahrnehmung der befragten Trainer. Diese lassen sich in die Schwerpunkte Prozessqualität / Aufgabenqualität bzw. Aufgabeninhalt / Rollenverständnis unterteilen. Parallelen zu Qualitätskriterien in typischen Dienstleistungsbranchen werden ersichtlich und durch Sportpsychologie-spezifische Kriterien ergänzt. Weitere, insbesondere auf bestimmte Sportarten bezogene, Erkenntnisse werden differenziert dargestellt.
Die abschließende Diskussion berücksichtigt insbesondere die Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der Repertory Grid Technik sowie die möglichen Konsequenzen der gefundenen Ergebnisse für die Qualität der angewandten Sportpsychologie.
This experimental study tests the hypothesis that symbolic role models' impact on entrepreneurial self-efficacy and behavioural intention varies according to whether models appeal to the observers' "ideal self" or "ought self". We measure the effects of exposure to role models narratives appealing to the desire of either self-achievement or self-commitment as motivators to engage in an entrepreneurial project while still in the university and to start a business after graduation. 44 French undergraduate students enrolled in an entrepreneurial curriculum participated to this research during the Fall 2006.
Objective: Research on the structure of the self has mostly developed separately from research on its content. Taking an integrative approach, we studied two structural aspects of the self associated with self-improvement, self-discrepancies and perceived mutability, by focusing on two content areas, traits and values. Studies 1a-1c. Method: 338 students (61% female) reported self-discrepancies in values and traits. Results: self-discrepancies in values are smaller than in traits. Study 2. Method: We experimentally induced either high or low mutability, and measured perceived mutability of traits and values. Results: values are perceived as less mutable than traits. Study 3. Method: 99 high-school students (60% female) reported their values, traits, and the extent to which they wish to change them. Results: values predict the wish to change traits whereas traits do not predict the wish to change values. Study 4. Method: 172 students (47.7% female) were assigned to one of four experimental conditions, in which they received feedback denoting either uniqueness or similarity to others, on either their values or their traits. Results: feedback that one's values (but not traits) are unique affected self-esteem. Conclusions: integrating between theories of content and structure of the self can contribute to the development of both.
